


Walk A Mile In My Shoes

by angelsfalling16



Category: Carry On Series - Rainbow Rowell
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Body Swap, First Kiss, Getting Together, M/M, SnowBaz, deNiall
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-12
Updated: 2019-09-12
Packaged: 2020-10-17 04:47:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 21,813
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20615231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angelsfalling16/pseuds/angelsfalling16
Summary: Simon and Baz switch bodies, and the only way to switch back is by finding a way to work together. It isn't easy at first, but the boys find that there is more to each other than they know.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> My fic for the Carry On Mini Bang! I had so much fun writing this, and even though it was stressful at times, I'd definitely do it again.
> 
> Thank you so much for beta reading @wo2ash and for putting up with my crazy messaging about this fic while I procrastinated writing it and then when I tried to poke holes in it. I really appreciate all your help <3
> 
> And thank you to @thecatis on Tumblr for making the lovely art for this fic, which can be found [here](https://thecatis.tumblr.com/post/187671502054/so-here-it-is-my-part-for-the-carry-on)

**Simon**

I slam the bathroom door behind me, still fuming. Luckily, I don’t feel like I’m about to go off. I’m just calm enough to be in control of my magic, but I still can’t seem to shake off this anger that’s covering me like a suffocating, hot blanket.

I’m just so tired of fighting with Baz. It’s the same thing every time. He says something cruel; I snap back defensively; he sneers at me and taunts me about how utterly useless I am at magic; and I try to keep myself from either hitting him or going off.

This time, I got so fed up with all of his snide remarks that I just turned away from him and stormed into the en suite.

As I try to calm down now, the fight we just had seems ridiculous. I can’t even remember what we were fighting about this time or what started it. Of all the fights that Baz and I have ever had, this one was definitely one of the tamer ones. It was almost like we were fighting just to fight, rather than fighting to solve something.

I don’t understand it, and it’s not just this fight. It’s almost all of our fights these past few years. There’s no real anger behind them. It’s like we’re just trying to get a rise out of each other because some kind of reaction is better than being completely ignored by each other.

I should be happy to be ignored by him, but really, it feels weird on the days when he barely even glances my way, almost like there’s something missing. I just don’t know what it is.

I close my eyes and work on trying to focus my breathing. As I stand there, leaning against the door, something like a wave of magic rushes over me. Only, it’s not like any magic that I’ve ever felt before.

It feels cool and clean, impersonal. It definitely isn’t mine, and it doesn’t feel like Baz’s magic either.

It does feel powerful, though. It rolls over me like it has a purpose and like nothing can stand in its way, but it doesn’t feel like it’s trying to harm me.

It passes over me quickly, and when I open my eyes again and look around, trying to find the source, I freeze as I realize that I’m no longer in the en suite.

I’m back out in the room, and for some reason, I’m sitting on Baz’s bed. I jump up off of it, knowing that if Baz catches me on it, he’ll kill me. Or start another fight at least, which I don’t really want to deal with right now.

Speaking of Baz, he’s nowhere in sight. He must have left while I was in the bathroom, meaning that I can’t ask him whether he felt that odd magic.

I’m not sure how I got back out here, though. Maybe it has something to do with that magic I felt. It doesn’t seem like the spell did anything more than move me from the en suite to out here, so maybe whoever it was wasn’t trying to harm me. It still doesn’t explain why they did it. What was their goal?

I look around the room again, wondering who – or what – could have cast that kind of magic, but I don’t see anything out of the ordinary. At the sound of a door opening, I turn. Someone is stepping out of the en suite, and I frown. No one else was here in our room, so that means whoever that is must have been the person that cast the spell.

I stand very still, waiting for the person to step out, and when I see who it is, something like a mix of fear and confusion flows over and through me. I wonder whether I should try to run or stay and fight, but my confusion wins, so I choose to stay.

The person now standing in mine and Baz’s room is me. Or rather, someone who looks just like me. It must be some kind of shape-shifting creature.

Or the Humdrum.

I reach for my sword, muttering the incantation to summon it, but it doesn’t appear. I try it again, my hand shaking as the person - thing - steps toward me. It still doesn’t come, and I give up, wishing that I hadn’t just thrown my wand down earlier. I don’t know why the sword isn’t coming, but I have to do something.

I take up what I hope is an imposing stance, facing the imposter just as they say, “Simon? Is that you?”

It’s my voice, but there’s something about it that doesn’t sound quite right, like it’s someone else’s voice in there, too.

The imposter stops, but they don’t reach for any kind of weapon, so I relax my stance, just slightly. I glance at the door and prepare to flee if I need to.

“What did you do?” The way that they curl their lips, and the tone of the accusation tell me just who it is that’s wearing my face.

**Baz**

Simon stomps off into the bathroom, and I sink down onto my bed, running a hand through my hair and wondering why I always do things like this. I keep starting meaningless fights, and I know that it isn’t just because he irritates me sometimes.

That’s part of the reason, but there’s more to it than that, even if I don’t like admitting it to myself. I just hate looking at him and seeing all of the things that I’ll never have.

He’s got all of this magic inside of him that he can barely use, and while I’m not an unpowerful mage, I can’t help but be jealous of him and angry at him for wasting that kind of gift. Plus, he’s perfectly human, and I have had to spend most of my life hiding the fact that I’m a vampire from everyone I know.

And then there’s the fact that I’m hopelessly in love with him.

I couldn’t have just been jealous of him and wished that I was him. No, instead, I had to fall head over heels for a guy who could never feel the same way about me.

He didn’t even do anything to deserve the rude comment that I sent his way when I stepped into our room. There was just something about the way that he looked when his blue eyes met mine, and my choices were to stutter out something incoherent and make a fool of myself or to insult him and try to play it cool.

Obviously, I went with the second option, but neither of our hearts really seemed to be in it. Fighting with Simon just seems to be a habit, a chore even. I would much rather be doing things other than fighting with him.

With a sigh, I let my head fall into my hands, and after a moment, I feel something wash over me. It feels like magic, but it’s strange and unfamiliar, nothing like I’ve ever felt before. It passes relatively quickly, but something feels weird, off. Something has shifted within me.

I look up to try to find out what caused the change, and I find myself looking at Simon.

Only, it isn’t actually Simon; it’s his reflection, and somehow, I’ve taken his place in the en suite. I don’t know how that happened or why I would be seeing his reflection instead of my own.

It has to be some kind of prank that he’s pulling to get back at me for the fight. I should have known that he wouldn’t give up so easily. I just don’t understand what the point of this prank would be. To freak me out for a few seconds? That would be ridiculous.

But as I look down, an unsettling feeling settles in my stomach when, instead of seeing the grayish tone of my own skin, I see the pale, freckled skin of Simon’s, wrapped in his school-issued pyjamas that he was wearing just a moment ago.

I look back up, and I find myself staring into Simon’s blue eyes. It isn’t an illusion. For some reason, I look like Simon.

I reach up to touch my hair, and rather than the sleek strands that I’m used to, I feel the soft curls of Simon’s hair.

_I’m in Simon’s body_, I realize.

I don’t know why or how, but I’m trapped in his body. Which must mean that Simon is in _my_ body.

This is more than just a stupid prank. This is Simon screwing with our lives, and I’ve got to make him change us back.

I turn and open the door, hoping that he hasn’t left our room to go anywhere to do something awful as me.

I’m only a little relieved when I see him, and when he sees me, he falls into a defensive stance, which is a little strange, but honestly, I don’t blame him. I kind of want to hit him, regardless of the Anathema. Why did he do this?

“Simon?” I say, stepping closer. “Is that you?” I have to be certain.

He doesn’t say anything, only continues to stare, and I stop just a few steps away from him.

“What did you do?” I ask him. The only explanation for any of this is that Simon must have done something when he went into the bathroom. There’s no one else here who could have done anything.

His expression turns into a glare, and he says, “What do you mean? I haven’t done anything. If anybody here did something, it was you.”

“Why do you think _I_ did something?” I say defensively.

“Because I don’t even know what happened. And magic caused this. I don’t even have my wand on me, and even if I did, you and I both know that I’m rubbish at magic.”

“We’ve obviously switched bodies.”

“What?” He honestly looks confused. Maybe I was wrong about him doing this.

“What did you think happened? That I made myself look like you and then somehow made us switch places?”

He shrugs, and I roll my eyes. Of course he would think that.

“Go look at yourself in the mirror if you don’t believe me.”

He looks at me warily before carefully stepping around me to get to the en suite, and I watch as he looks himself over in the mirror.

“I’m you,” he gasps.

“And I’m you,” I say in a bored tone, wishing that he would just undo whatever it is that he did so that we can get on with our lives. I don’t want to be like this any longer than I have to.

“Switch us back,” Simon demands, turning back to face me.

It’s strange. I’m looking at myself, but it still feels like I’m looking at Simon. It really is him. He just looks like me.

From the way that he’s looking at me and the edge of panic in his voice, I start to believe that he didn’t do this. I don’t know what happened to us then. Maybe it doesn’t matter, so long as we can switch back.

“I didn’t do this,” I say calmly.

“Then, who did?”

“I don’t know.”

“How do we switch back?”

“I don’t know,” I repeat, starting to get irritated. Why does he think that I have all of the answers?

“So, we’re stuck like this?”

“Just because neither of us cast the spell that caused this, it doesn’t mean that we can’t cast one to undo it,” I say, getting an idea. “Give me my wand.”

“Um,” he says, looking at me helplessly.

I step forward and reach into the pocket of his - my - blazer and pull out my wand. He tenses under my touch, and I quirk an eyebrow at him before stepping back again. The expression feels weird on his face, but hopefully, we won’t be stuck like this for much longer.

I hold out my wand between us, but it feels weird and unfamiliar in my grasp, and I know that this won’t work.

“Wait,” I say. “Give me your wand.”

He frowns but does as I say, moving over to his bed and picking up his wand before turning and slowly handing it to me, as though he thinks that I’m going to hurt him now that I’ve got both of our wands.

I shake my head and hold up his wand this time and attempt to draw on my magic. It comes, but it feels weird, like something is wrong with it.

I shake off the feeling and try casting a couple of spells. The words don’t come out right, and even though I can feel the magic there, I can’t get ahold of it. This isn’t going to work either.

“You try,” I tell Simon, handing him my wand.

“But...I’m bad at it.”

“Just try.” I thrust my wand into his hand.

“Okay. Which spell should I use?”

I instruct him on a couple of spells to use and how to say them, and even though he casts them almost perfectly, nothing changes.

We go through several more, a few of them even in French, but still, it doesn’t work.

“It’s not going to work,” I say aloud with a sigh.

“There has to be something. We should keep trying.”

“It’s not like there’s a spell to return someone to their own body,” I snap at him.

As far as I know, this has never happened to anyone before, which means we’re stuck like this.

“So, we’re stuck like this,” Simon says, voicing my thoughts.

“We’ll figure something out, but yeah, I think we’re stuck like this for now.”

“Great.”

I start to feel sick as the realization sinks in, and of all the things that I could say right now, the words that slip out are, “I’m not going to have to kiss Agatha, am I?”

Simon glares before biting out, “We broke up.”

“Oh, good.” I feel relieved for just a moment before I realize how mean what I just said sounded. “I didn’t mean it like that,” I say, attempting to explain myself to him. “I just mean—.”

“It’s fine,” he snaps, cutting me off. “She and I never would’ve worked out anyway.”

“Why not?” I ask softly, not sure why I care.

“Look, can we not talk about this? I don’t know why you care; it’s not like we’re friends or anything.”

“Right.” It’s true. We aren’t friends, so I can’t expect him to tell me something like that. “Well, I think I’m going to go to bed. We can try to figure this out tomorrow once we’ve gotten some rest.”

I’m not really all that tired, but I’m hoping that when I wake up in the morning, all of this will just have been a crazy dream.


	2. Chapter 2

**Baz**

It definitely wasn’t a dream, and I barely got any sleep last night. It’s hard to sleep when you don’t feel comfortable in your own body because it isn’t your own. It’s someone else’s. You can’t get comfortable, and your movements feel strange.

When I finally give up on sleep and stumble half-asleep to the bathroom, deciding to take a hot shower, hoping that it will help me to relax, I realize that in a moment, I’ll be seeing Simon’s naked body, and honestly, it makes me feel a little sick.

Yes, there have been moments late at night when I imagined that Simon was holding himself above me as I pushed myself up to kiss him, and no, he was not always dressed in those fantasies. But this is different.

If I were to use this as an opportunity to look at Simon’s body, it would feel wrong. It wouldn’t be right to take advantage of this moment.

Deciding to forgo the shower, I cast a cleaning spell on myself. It isn’t necessarily the most sanitary way of doing things, but it’s better than nothing. After that, I dress quickly, keeping my gaze trained on the wall and not looking in the mirror until I’m fully dressed in the Watford uniform.

I run a hand through my hair - Simon’s hair - and try to figure out a way to try to tame some of the curls. I try a few different hair products that I usually put in my own hair, but it doesn’t help at all. I even try an old spell that I used to use on my hair before I discovered that it was easier to do it myself, but that doesn’t work either. If anything, it actually makes it look worse.

Finally, I give up and step out into the room. Simon is just waking up, and from the expression on his face when he sees me, he was probably hoping that this was all a dream, too.

I turn away from him and start gathering my things for class when I realize that I’ll need to take Simon’s stuff if I want to keep up appearances and not tip anyone off to the fact that something is going on with us.

“Where is your school stuff?” I ask him.

“Over there,” he says pointing and yawning. “But don’t you think that we should skip class today? Until we can figure this out?” He gestures between us vaguely.

“What good will sitting around our room, twiddling our thumbs do?” I sneer.

“Don’t you think people will figure out something’s up?”

“Not if we pretend to be each other.”

“Do you really think that will work?”

I look at him for a moment, and even though the answer on the tip of my tongue is no, I nod. We’ll have to make it work.

“Just don’t make me look bad, and we’ll be fine. I’ll go to the library during lunch to see if I can find something to help us”

He doesn’t look happy about this plan but agrees anyway, and I head down to breakfast, arriving before almost anyone else.

When Bunce arrives, I manage to act relatively normal, but I keep an eye out for Simon.

He doesn’t show up until halfway through breakfast, and I had begun to think that he had changed his mind and wasn’t going to show up at all. I wouldn’t blame him if he had. Just sitting here is making me anxious, and I want to run back to our room and try every spell we can think of until we’re back to normal.

I’m determined to get through this, though, which will only work if Simon cooperates. I just hope that he can act enough like me to not raise suspicion, but when I see him, I think that maybe I was wrong to hope for that.

_ What the hell did he do to my hair? _

**Simon**

Walking into the dining hall, I worry that people will take one look at me and know that I’m not Baz, but the only person who really pays attention to me is Baz, who seems to be glaring daggers at me. Or, more accurately, my hair.

I couldn’t figure out how to use any of his hair products, and I don’t know why he insists on slicking it back anyway. After I brushed it and parted it to one side, it looked really nice. It may not be how he would normally wear it, but I can’t help that. He didn’t instruct me on how to wear it, and I would have rather stayed in bed anyway. I barely slept last night.

Turning away from his angry gaze, I pile a plate with food and move to join Dev and Niall at their table. I nod a hello at them before digging in.

My mouth starts to feel weird, but I don’t think anything of it until I look up to see Dev and Niall staring at me.

“_Baz _,” Dev hisses. “What are you doing?”

“What do you mean?” I ask.

“Your fangs are showing.” Niall’s eyes are wide as he stares at me, and I quickly move to cover my mouth with my hand. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you eat this much in public.”

“Stress eating,” I say with a shrug, hoping that they won’t ask questions. I finish breakfast with my hand covering my mouth, but I’m suddenly very aware of the extra teeth in my mouth.

Dev and Niall mostly talk to each other, and they don’t seem to expect much input from me, which is a relief. I have no idea what I would say to them. I’d probably say all of the wrong things.

I’ve always been aware of the fact that Baz never eats in the dining hall, but I always thought that maybe he had an eating disorder or just didn’t like eating in front of other people. I had no idea that his fangs popped out whenever he ate.

He must sneak off to the kitchen to get food. It must be lonely that, eating away from everyone else. One of my favorite parts of the day is sitting in the dining hall, eating and talking to people. It’s the one time when I can stop stressing about school and the Humdrum, even if it’s for just a short amount of time. And it’s one of the few times during the day that I know exactly where Baz is and know that he’s not off plotting something right at that moment.

It must be awful to sit here and not feel that kind of comfort. It makes me feel a little bad for Baz.

**Baz**

“What is up with you today?” Penelope asks as we walk together to class.

I’m trying to catch sight of Simon again, wondering if I can berate him for wearing my hair like that before class begins. No one will take me seriously if he wears my hair down like that, letting the waves fall around my face as if I don’t care about trying to make it look presentable.

“What do you mean?” I ask, a little distractedly.

“You’re staring at Baz even more than usual today. It’s like you think he’s personally offended you or something. And you didn’t eat a single bite of food.”

I may not have eaten anything, but Simon did. Luckily, he had enough sense to try to cover the fangs. I have to admit that even though it was strange, It was kind of nice to see him eat like that in my body. I’ve never been so carefree like that in my own body.

I’m always worried about what people will think of me and about trying to keep anyone from seeing my fangs. Simon doesn’t have those worries, and for a moment, I got a glimpse of what it would be like to be without those worries myself.

I suppose if we’re going to keep this up, I’m going to have to eat like he does. That might be nice, to not have to eat in secret, to be able to eat with everyone else. I’ll have to remember that at lunch time.

“I wasn’t hungry,” I say to Penny. “And I think Baz did something to me.” I’m hoping that that will be enough of an explanation for her.

She sighs and rolls her eyes, a surprising reaction.

“Not this again. What do you think he did this time?”

“W-what do you mean?” The words stutter out of me, like they don’t want to come out. What does she mean ‘this time’?

“First, you thought that he was trying to kill you. Then, you thought he was a vampire. Now, what is it?”

“He thinks that I’m—?” I cut myself off as I realize my mistake. Trying to remedy it, I try to think of what Simon would say about me in this situation. “I mean, I think he’s out to murder me.”

She looks at me funny. “When do you _ not _think that?”

“Oh, right.” It’s been a couple of years since I actually did something that could be construed as me trying to seriously injure him, but I suppose I can see why Simon hates me so much. He’s probably still suspicious of me. “I really do think he did something this time.”

It’s the truth. Simon and I are both suspicious of each other, still unsure how we switched bodies.

“What did he do?”

“He…” I drift off. Bunce would never believe me. “Forget it. I’m probably wrong.”

“Simon, don’t you think it’s time for you to let go of this obsession with Baz?”

“Obsession?”

“Yes, I know you don’t see it that way, but come on. The staring. The stalking. The thinking that he’s always plotting something. Can’t we just have one year that doesn’t revolve around Baz Pitch and the Families?”

“I—. It’s not that—. I-It’s—.” I try to start several different sentences, but I can’t seem to get any words out. It’s like the words are in my head, but I can’t figure out a way to say them. They’re caught in my throat, and I don’t know how to fix it.

Is this what it’s like for Simon?

All those times people tell him to just :use his words,” getting annoyed with him, there was nothing that he could do about it. It wasn’t his fault.

A little guiltily, I realize that I’m one of those people. I never tried to understand what was going on with him. I just used it as one more thing to tease him about.

_ It’s no wonder that he hates me _ , I think as I take a seat next to Penny, no longer concerned about Simon or what he did to my hair. _ I’ve never given him a reason not to. _

Suddenly, I’m overwhelmed with the urge to try to change that, but it would be useless. There’s no way that I can change Simon’s opinion of me. Not after all these years. I’d probably have a better chance of beating the Humdrum on my own.

Simon and I just aren’t meant to be friends, and I accepted that a long time ago.

**Simon**

Pretending to be Baz is hard.

In class, I’m expected to have the answers to the questions that the teachers ask, and when I don’t, I can feel their disappointment in me. Usually, I wouldn’t care – I’m used to it by now – but as Baz, I feel like I’m supposed to.

And I don’t know how to talk to his friends. What do they even talk about? Does he share his evil plans with them? Should I be trying to figure out what he’s been plotting with them while I have the chance? Or are they in the dark about what he does?

By lunchtime, I’m ready to give up. I don’t want to have a repeat of breakfast, so I decide to skip it and head out to walk along the edge of the woods, wishing that I could go talk to Ebb.

Of course, I can’t do that either. She might have answers for how we could switch back, but I promised Baz that I wouldn’t tell anyone about us. Plus, she would think I was Baz, and I don’t know how well that would go over, so I settle for walking alone.

I can’t stop thinking about Baz being a vampire. I always thought that he was, but Penny was right – I never had any proof. Now, I know for sure that he is, and I could easily tell, or even show, anyone, but I don’t want to do that to him.

I’ve been a vampire for less than a day, and I’ve already seen how difficult it can be. I can’t even eat in front of people without my fangs popping out. I don’t know how Baz does it.

They seem to pop out any time I think about food, which I found out when I went to inspect them. I stopped by my room before I came out here to walk alone, and I was curious about what the fangs looked like, so I decided to take a look at them.

My first thought when I stepped into the en suite was, _ so vampires _ do _ show up in mirrors _.

It wasn’t all that surprising to be honest. I mean, Baz probably wouldn’t be able to make his hair look so perfect if he wasn’t able to see it.

I opened my mouth (or rather, Baz’s mouth) wide so that I could inspect his teeth, but there was nothing out of the ordinary with them. His fangs seemed to have just disappeared.

I started to think about food then, roast beef and Yorkshire pudding - my favorite, and my mouth started to fill with saliva at the thought. Then, I could feel it. The fangs popped out, filling my mouth.

“Wicked,” I murmured, although it came out a little slurred. It was really neat.

Now, as I walk beside the trees, the sun beating down on me, I wonder if being a vampire causes Baz’s skin to sparkle in the sunlight. I’m pretty sure that I read about that in a book one time. Though, I suppose someone would have noticed that by now, what with all the time he spends out on the pitch.

I bet he’d look dazzling like that, though.

I keep walking, trying to think about other things, something other than Baz, but that’s made difficult by the fact that I look exactly like him. The good thing is that we won’t be like this for long. Baz will figure out a way to switch us back, and we’ll be back to normal by tomorrow.

That helps me relax a bit and I continue on.

I’m staring at the ground as I walk, and I don’t see the creature in front of me until I nearly run into it.

I startle at the sight of it. It looks like a flying monkey, but it’s ears and tail belong to some other kind of animal, and when it opens its mouth, little puffs of fire come out. I’ve never seen anything like it before.

There’s no sucking feeling in the air, so it wasn’t sent by the Humdrum. I don’t know where else it could have come from, though. As I look closer - as close as I dare anyway - it seems pretty small, like it might be a young creature, which would explain why its fire breath isn’t very strong.

Still, it seems intent on attacking me, even laughing as it does so and doing little flips in the air, as though it were playing a game.

I reach for my sword, murmuring the incantation, but it doesn’t come. I try again, but still, nothing happens. That rarely happens, and it definitely doesn’t happen when I’m in trouble.

It has to be because I’m in Baz’s body - I don’t have the sword anymore. I’m going to have to try magic.

I pull the wand out of my pocket. It’s Baz’s wand. I’ve been carrying it around all day, but I haven’t had to use it until now. It’s darker than mine, and it feels both familiar and unfamiliar in my grasp. I don’t have time to think about that, though, because the threat is getting closer.

Summoning my magic, I say the first spell that comes to mind.

The words roll off of my tongue easily, and I can feel the magic light up inside of me. It’s just as Baz once told me. It’s as though I’ve struck a match, and the flame is building as I call on it, pushing the magic out through my fingers and into my wand.

The spell goes off perfectly, and I’m frozen in awe as I watch it.

I never knew that magic could feel this way, so easily controlled and like it’s a part of me, rather than like it’s trying to burst out of me.

It isn’t actually a harmful spell. It’s just one that will sting the creature and hopefully make it go away. I cast another one, and it seems to work as the thing begins to fly up, but it stops when it’s hovering just above the trees.

I cast one more spell, and with what sounds like a wounded cry, it turns and flies away.

I stand there for a while, wanting to cast another spell just to feel the way that it washes through me, but then I realize that I’m about to be late for class, so I have to run. I spend that whole class smiling to myself and marveling at good I feel.

I’ve never felt this way before. I feel like I could do anything, defeat any creature that the Humdrum sends my way, and not worry about the spell going off wrong and doing more bad than good. I wish I could feel this way every day.

As I’m walking to my next class, I’m suddenly being pulled to the side, away from the crowd of students. I reach for my wand, ready to defend myself, but I relax when I see that it’s just Baz.

“Where have you been? You weren’t at lunch.”

Shrugging, I tell him, “I went for a walk.”

“Well, I can’t use my magic.” He says it like an accusation, like I did something to him.

“Well, mine is working great.”

He glares at me.

“There’s a problem with my sword, though,” I say. “And by that, I mean that it’s technically your sword now.”

“Really?” He looks curious, but also a little excited about that even though he tries to hide it. He holds his hand out over his hip, and makes a face like he’s trying to concentrate, but nothing happens. After a moment, he sighs, frustrated.

“You have to say the incantation,” I tell him.

“What?”

“The sword only comes if you say the incantation, and it only comes if it trusts you.”

“What’s the incantation?

“In justice. In courage. In defence of the weak. In the face of the mighty. Through magic and wisdom and good.”

He frowns. “That’s a lot. Are you sure it will even work for me?”

“Yes. Just try it.”

I wait, and I’m almost certain that he isn’t going to do it. He’s glaring at me again, but finally, he sighs, and I tell him the incantation again, slower this time so that he can repeat it.

I watch Baz as the sword materializes in his hand, and his face lights up with something like joy when he sees it. Even though, I’m really looking at my own face, I can see Baz in it. In the way he’s careful to show his emotions and the way he’s still looking at me a bit distrustfully.

“We should get to class,” he says, watching the sword as it moves in his hand.

He turns his wrist and manages to put it away without any instruction from me. I suppose that isn’t too surprising since he has seen me do it hundreds of times.

“Did you find anything during lunch that could help us?” I ask as we begin walking.

“No.” He shakes his head. “Nothing in any of the books that I looked at were of any help.

“So, we’re still stuck like this.” I sigh.

“Don’t worry. We’ll figure it out,” he says, and for some reason, I believe him.

**Baz**

After dinner, Simon walks into our room, looking pale and a little unsteady on his feet. His face is colorless, which could be just from the fact that he’s a bloodless vampire now, but I know the difference between that and the way that Simon looks now.

I get off my bed and move towards him, stopping when there is just a couple of feet of space between us, not wanting to invade his space.

“Simon, are you okay?” I ask.

“I’m fine. There’s no need to sound so worried.”

I would believe him if he didn’t stumble on his next step, nearly falling. I move closer, reaching out a hand to steady him, but he shrugs me off, so I drop it.

“You don’t look fine,” I say, pushing my hands into my pockets to keep myself from reaching out to him again.

“I just feel faint a-and hungry. But not really hungry. It’s like—.”

“Like you’re thirsty,” I say quietly, understanding dawning on me.

He looks at me finally and nods.

“Yeah, but not for water.”

“For blood.”

“What?” He asks, and I expect him to sound disgusted, but mostly he just seems confused.

“I have to feed—. I mean, you have to feed—.” I shake my head. This is all a little confusing. “A vampire has to feed or they start to feel sick.”

“You mean you feel like this a lot?” He asks, his eyes searching my face for something.

I turn my face away at the sound of concern in his voice.

“Only if I don’t feed every day.” I shrug like it’s no big deal, but I still won’t look at him.

“Oh,” he says softly, seeming to begin to understand, “and I haven’t done anything since we switched bodies yesterday. Sorry,” he adds, and I’m not sure why he’s apologizing to me.

“It’s my fault,” I tell him.

“How?”

“I should have thought about this. I should have told you, made sure that you knew what you needed.”

“Hey,” he says softly, and I feel his hand on my arm briefly before it’s gone again, like he wanted to try to comfort me but wasn’t sure how. “This isn’t your fault. None of it is.” His voice is so soft and gentle that I can’t help but turn back to him.

There’s so much in the way that he says it and in the way that he’s looking at me, like he’s talking about more than just this one thing.

“Okay. But I can fix this,” I tell him. “We can fix it,” I amend, because he’s going to have to learn how to do this in case it takes us a while to figure out how to switch back.

“Great, what do I need to do?”

**Simon**

“I am not going to eat a rat.”

Baz and I are standing down in the Catacombs, close to where I confronted him back in fifth year. That was the last time that I was down here, and now, as our roles are almost reversed, I understand why he didn’t want me to find him.

This isn’t something that you want to do while someone watches you, but I don’t have a choice. Baz has been doing this for years, and without his help, I’d be starving right now. I have to let him teach me.

It’s dark down here, or it would be if I couldn’t see in the dark. I always guessed Baz could, with the way that he moved around our room in the dark at night, but it’s different to actually be experiencing it.

Something moves past my feet, and I practically jump away from it. This definitely isn’t going to bode well for me if I can’t even stand to be near a rat.

I definitely don’t want to drink the blood from one.

“You won’t be _eating _ it,” Baz says with a frown, as though he wants to insult me but is holding himself back.

“It’ll be going in my mouth.”

He sighs, sounding annoyed. But how can he blame me? This is disgusting. He doesn’t know what it’s like to stand here, a strange feeling rolling through his body, knowing that the only way to stop it is to drink blood.

As soon as the thought goes through my mind, I realize how stupid it sounds.

Baz _ does _ know what it’s like.

He’s had to do this every day for who knows how long, and I’m only having to do this until we get back into our bodies. 

I feel bad for thinking that way. I had no idea what it was like for him, and all I ever did was try to force him to tell me about something that he was ashamed of. But surely there is a better way of doing this.

“Isn’t there some kind of spell for this?” I ask him.

“For feeding?”

I shrug. “Yeah. Why not?”

“Really, Snow? Do you honestly think that Mages spend time trying to find a way to use their magic to help _ vampires _? They all hate us.”

“I don’t hate you,” I say. It surprises us both, and we’re quiet for a long moment. Breaking the silence, I ask, “What about your family? Couldn’t they have come up with something to help you?”

“We don’t exactly sit around talking about it.”

The way he says it and the expression on his face makes me see that there’s more to it than that. He doesn’t just have to hide this part of him from everyone at school, but he also, for the most part, keeps it from his family.

It must be awful to have to keep such a big part of him a secret.

And if we don’t find a way to switch back, it will be my secret.

“Okay,” I say, feeling determined. “Tell me what to do.”

**Baz**

Simon and I are squatting on the ground, and he’s looking at me intently as we wait for another rat. The back of my neck warms under his watchful eyes, and I have trouble concentrating.

Luckily, we don’t have to wait too long.

I reach out to grab the rat, and it’s like a reflex. I just have to be quiet enough and fast enough to catch it. I could do this in my sleep. My hand reaches for it, but before I get anywhere close to it, the rat has scurried away.

I frown. I’m not fast anymore. At least not the way that I was. It took my vampire speed to do this, and now that I’m in Simon’s body - which isn’t slow exactly, just not fast enough - I can’t catch the rat. I’m just going to have to walk him through it.

This is going to be a long night.

“I’m not fast enough,” I begin, “but you are. All you have to do is wait for the rat to come near you and reach out quickly to grab it.”

“And then what?”

“And your fangs should just, um, pop out. I-It’s more instinctual than something that you have to think about. Holding the rat and thinking about drinking its blood should be enough.”

“Do I really have to think about it? I really don’t want to.”

I sigh. “I’m sorry, but it’s the only way.” I really am sorry. I would never wish this upon my greatest enemy, and Simon is definitely not that. I hate that he has to go through this.

He shakes his head. “No, don’t apologize. I can do this.”

He doesn’t sound like he even believes himself, and I wish that this was something that I could just do it for him.

“How many do I have to drink?” He asks.

“As many as it takes to feel full. With how long it’s been since the last time that I fed, I would say at least three or four. Just do it until you feel good, alright?”

He nods slowly, taking a deep breath. “Alright.”

***

Half an hour and four drained rats later, there is blood streaming down Simon’s face, but he looks pleased with himself. He’s a mess, but he’s exactly who he was in his own body, just with my physical attributes.

It’s strange not to feel the stirring in my stomach at the sight of the blood, and I almost begin to miss it. Being a vampire was so much of who I am that it’s weird to be without it.

I never thought that I’d actually_ want _ to be a vampire, but I don’t know how to not be one. It’s who I am, and without that, I don’t know who - or what - I am.

Simon gives me a sheepish smile when he catches me looking, and it’s a soft look, something that I could never pull off myself.

I want to reach out and wipe the blood away, run my finger along the lower edge of his mouth. I feel myself blush as the thought flashes through my mind. It’s something I’m not used to, feeling my face heat up at the way that he’s looking at me.

It’s not an unpleasant feeling, but I hate the thought that it could give away exactly how I feel about him.

Even though, I’m looking at myself, I’m very much looking at Simon. It’s all in the way that he holds himself and the expression on his face, full of life despite the fact that the body that he is in is lifeless.

Instead of reaching out to him, I look away, curling my fingers into fists to keep myself from doing something stupid.

Even though he’s been dealt this awful thing, being stuck being a vampire, he’s somehow managed to make it seem like not such a bad thing. I don’t know how he does it.

As himself, he can’t control his magic and is being targeted by the Humdrum, and as me, he’s suddenly a creature he never expected to be. And still, when he looks up at me, he’s smiling, albeit somewhat bashfully.

He’s everything good in the world. He manages to fight past everything bad in this world and make it all look not so terrifying.

It’s one of the reasons that I fell in love with him, and it’s causing me to fall even harder for him now.

If he isn’t bothered by being a vampire, then maybe I don’t have to be either.

Yeah, it’s a terrible thing that happened to me when I was little, but maybe I don’t have to let it rule my life so much. Maybe I can find a way to be happy with who I am.

Simon even said that he didn’t hate me, which should not have sent my stomach fluttering like it did, but it meant so much to hear that from him.

I want to tell him that I don’t hate him either, but it would be weird if I did it now, so I just watch him quietly, letting him feed until he’s ready to leave.

**Simon**

“I don’t understand how you do this all the time,” I say as Baz and I begin to make our way back up out of the Catacombs.

“I don’t really have a choice.”

“I—. Sorry.” I can never seem to say the right thing to him. Even now that I can actually use my words, I don’t know how to talk to Baz.

He shakes his head. “It’s not your fault.”

I’m quiet for a bit, trying to think of something to say that won’t upset him. Baz speaks again before I do.

“Do you think that you’ll be able to do this on your own next time? Or do you need some more help?”

I don’t even know if there will be a next time, but I find myself not wanting to do it alone. It’s so much better when he’s doing it with me, but I don’t have a good enough reason to ask him to stay.

“I think I’ve got it,” I tell him.

He nods as we continue to walk in silence. Neither of us speak until we’ve made it out of the Catacombs and out of the Chapel, the cool night air blowing around us.

Baz stops in his tracks once we’re outside and turns to look at me.

“I need you to do something for me,” He says, his tone serious.

“Okay,” I say slowly, warily.

“Dev and Niall already know that I...that I’m a vampire, but I need it to be kept a secret. I don’t want everyone to know that I’m a vampire. I don’t want them to know that I’m a monster,” he adds a little quieter.

“You’re not a monster,” I say, meaning it.

“Right, because right now you’re the one who’s a vampire.”

“No, that’s not—,” I begin, but he cuts me off.

“It’s okay, Snow. I accepted this truth a long time ago.”

He starts leading the way back to Mummers House, and I quietly follow after him. Our footsteps are loud as we cut through the grass, crunching beneath our feet, and it’s almost as though my hearing is enhanced.

Is that something else that comes with being a vampire? Heightened senses?

I want to ask Baz about it, but he already said that he doesn’t know much about being a vampire. It was just forced upon him, and he has had to figure out all of this on his own.

That must have been awful. To be five years old and not only lose your mother, but also have this new thing that you have to deal with. Something that separates you from everyone else.

It’s a little like how my volatile magic keeps me separated from the other mages at our school, but that isn’t a fair comparison. In capable hands, my magic may be used for good, but Baz is stuck as something he can’t control, something that can only be used to hurt people in the same way that he was hurt.

I honestly don’t see him as a monster, though. Yeah, he isn’t the easiest person to get along with, but that doesn’t make him a bad person.

I just have to make him see that, make him see himself through my eyes.

I almost laugh aloud at that thought because he is literally looking at himself through my eyes.

We walk in silence the rest of the way back to our room, and I try to think of ways to see himself the way that I see him before we switch back.

When we get to our room, we move around each other quietly as we get ready for bed. It isn’t the usual silence, though. It’s more comfortable, and it feels like something has changed between the two of us, something more than just switching bodies.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Baz asks as I start to climb into bed.

“Going to bed?”

“That’s my bed.”

“You have more blankets, and I’m freezing,” I explain. I was stupid to hope that he wouldn’t say anything about it. “I could barely sleep last night. We should close the window.”

“No, it feels nice.”

We’re having the same argument that we’ve had countless times before, but this time, I can see it from his perspective.

“Okay, keep the window open, but let me take a few of your blankets.

He sighs. “Just sleep in my bed.”

“Are you sure?”

Suddenly, it seems very weird. We’ll be sleeping in each other’s beds, enveloped in each other’s scents as we drift off to sleep.

“Yeah, it’s fine.” He runs a hand through his hair as we look at each other for a moment.

I’m the one to break the silence this time.

“Alright. Well, goodnight.”

As I climb into his bed and pull his blankets tightly around me, I have to admit that Baz smells rather nice, and I don’t mind being wrapped in his scent.


	3. Chapter 3

**Simon**

Baz and I manage to make it through most of the next day without any trouble, but when I enter our room after dinner, I know immediately that something is wrong. Our room smells smoky, like something is burning, and I can feel pulses of something like magic.

When I catch sight of Baz sitting on his bed, a haze of red around his edges, I begin to understand what’s going on. I’ve lived through that myself countless times. I’ve never been on the opposite side of it, though, and it freaks me out a little, makes me worry that I’ll get hurt.

This must be what it’s like to be him when he riles me up enough to make me lose control of magic.

The only thing is that I haven’t done anything to cause this, so something else is wrong. What could possibly irritate Baz enough to cause this? He’s usually so cool and collected.

Being me has ruined him.

“Baz,” I say, but he doesn’t look at me. I move across the room to stand in front of him and try again. “Baz what’s wrong?”

He shakes his head. “N-nothing. I’m fine.” His voice shakes, and the haze gets brighter.

“You’re not fine. Let me help you.”

I reach out gingerly and rest my hands on his shoulders, trying to get his attention. He startles, but he doesn’t push me away. There’s this weird sensation in my hands as they connect with his shoulders, but I ignore it, chalking it up to the magic pouring off of him in waves.

“Baz, you have to calm down. Just take a deep breath and focus on the sound of my voice.”

“W-what’s happening to me?” His voice is low and frightened, and I’ve never seen him like this before. Even when we faced off against that chimera in fifth year, he kept his cool, sneering at me to use my magic.

I can’t help but feel like this change is my fault. Maybe I didn’t cast the spell to make us switch bodies, but it is my magic that is making him feel this way.

“If I had to guess, I would say that you got my excess magic and the inability to control it along with my body. I mean...when we switched.”

“How do I fix it?”

“You can’t?” It comes out as a question even though I don’t mean it, too. I guess I’m still holding out hope that one day I’ll be able to use my magic like everyone else.

“There has to be a way.”

I roll my eyes at him. If there was a way, doesn’t he think that I would have figured it out by now?

“Let me know if you figure it out,” I tell him. “The best you can do is try to stay calm.”

“How can I stay calm when I’m in your body, and I can’t use my magic?” He’s frustrated, so I ignore the harshness in his tone. I know that he can’t really help it.

“You have the sword,” I say, shrugging.

“I’m not great with a sword.”

“Interesting,” I murmur, more to myself than him.

“What?” He finally looks up at me, and there’s this look in his eyes that lets me see just how hard this is for him.

“I finally found something that you’re not good at.”

“Seriously, Snow? That’s what you’re thinking about right now?” He raises his brows, and there’s almost a bit of humor in it, like he isn’t as angry as he wants me to think.

I shrug. “It makes you seem more human. Less perfect. Anyway, I can teach you how to use the sword.”

He pulls a face. “I’d rather not have to be in your body long enough to need to use a sword.”

I don’t think he’s even noticed that the red haze has begun to recede. It seems like talking is distracting him from whatever it was that was bothering him. This is a good sign. I’ve just got to keep him distracted and if not happy, then at least not too upset. Hopefully, that will be enough.

“Then, we need to find a way to switch back,” I tell him, dropping my hands to put some space between us. The haze is almost gone now.

“How?”

“I think we’re going to have to ask for help.”

“We can’t tell the professors. I don’t want everyone to know.”

“That’s not what I was going to suggest,” I tell him. “I think that there’s someone else who can help us.”

**Baz**

At first, I’m wary about letting anyone know about what’s going on with me and Simon, but after a second day of struggling to be each other and still not coming up with any answers on what happened to us or how to change us back, Simon and I agree that we need to ask for help, so we turn to the second smartest kid in the school - Penelope Bunce.

I didn’t want to ask her for help, but after nearly going off, I didn’t feel like I really had any other choice.

I was just so frustrated earlier after not being able to use my magic in class and not being able to figure out how to switch us back, and then I caught sight of Simon being happy, smiling like none of this was bothering him, and something just kind of snapped in me.

I couldn’t control it, and when Simon found me like that, all I could think about was how I didn’t want to hurt him. I kept trying to reign my magic back in, but I couldn’t control it.

Then, Simon was there in front of me, simply talking to me, and it was like the sound of his voice calmed me. He distracted me long enough for me to regain control of my magic

I don’t know how he does this every day, deals with his uncontrollable magic. After two days, I’m wishing that I didn’t have it all. I feel bad for all the times that I ever taunted him about it. I had no idea that this is what it was like for him. I always thought that he was just an incompetent mage.

I need to apologize to him, but I can’t find the words to tell him how awful I feel. Maybe when I’m back in my own body, I’ll be able to tell him how truly sorry I am.

We find Bunce exactly where Simon said she would be, in the back corner of the library. She’s sitting alone, surrounded by stacks of books, half of which I’m certain aren’t for any of our classes. I’m all for studying and reading outside of classwork, but even this looks like a bit much.

It makes me curious about what it’s for, though. She and I have never really talked before, so I’m not really sure what she plans to do once we all leave Watford, but I’m sure whatever it is, she’ll be brilliant at it.

She’s so engrossed in whatever it is that she is working on that she doesn’t even hear me approaching or notice that I’ve taken a seat across from her until I speak.

“Bun—. I mean, Penny. I could use your help with something,” I say.

“What is it?” She asks, looking up at me curiously.

“Baz.” She rolls her eyes. “It isn’t that. We just seem to be having a rather unusual problem.”

“And what would that be?”

“I’m not Simon.” It’s best to just get straight to the point. There’s no use in drawing it out.

“Of course, you are.” She obviously doesn’t believe me, and I didn’t really expect her to.

“No.” I shake my head. “I’m really not.”

“I’m Simon.” He’s standing right behind me, and even though we planned this part, I find that it’s difficult to get used to not being able to sense him coming.

“What?” She looks back and forth between the two of us and apparently decides that we’re telling the truth. “I guess that might explain some things, but how did this happen?”

“We aren’t exactly sure,” Simon says sheepishly. “Something happened the other night – we don’t know what exactly – but now we’re in each other’s bodies.” He sits down in the seat beside me then, far too close for comfort. 

Our arms brush, and I can feel sparks across my skin. I don’t know if I’ve imagined it or if this is some kind of side effect of switching bodies. It isn’t exactly an unpleasant feeling. It’s just unexpected, and I yearn to touch Simon again to test out what happens, to see if I imagined it.

When I look up into Simon’s face - my face - the expression that he’s wearing tells me that I did not imagine it. His cheeks turn a light shade of pink as our eyes meet. He must have fed recently.

“What’s going on?” Bunce asks, catching on that something is off.

“Nothing,” Simon says quickly.

I don’t know why he’s lying, but if he doesn’t want to tell her, I don’t have any objections. I don’t want to have to admit that it made my heart race from just that light touch or that I want it to happen again, test out what would happen if our skin were to touch more firmly.

Bunce looks at us weird but doesn’t ask about it again. She gets straight down to business.

“Why don’t you begin by telling me what happened before you two...switched bodies?”

**Simon**

“I should have known that it would be a fight that made something go wrong with you two,” Penny says, and it looks like she’s fighting hard not to roll her eyes at us. “Don’t you ever get along?”

We were getting along pretty well down in the catacombs the other night, but I don’t say that. I have to keep the fact that he’s a vampire a secret from her, and for some reason, I want to keep that bit of time between us a secret. It was one of the first times that we actually spent time together without getting into a fight.

“Simon, er, I mean, Baz. That was you the other morning when you thought that he,” she points at me, still looking uncertain, “had done something, wasn’t it?”

“I didn’t do anything to him,” I say defensively. “We all know that if I had tried to use my magic to hurt him, the Anathema would have kicked me out.”

“Well, you haven’t exactly been hurt by doing this, have you?” Baz says.

He has shifted his chair so that there’s too much space for us to accidentally bump against each other again. I don’t know what that spark was when we touched.

“I didn’t do anything.”

“Why would I believe that?”

“Why would I want to switch bodies?” I ask.

“To see what it’s like to be me,” he sneers. Somehow, it isn’t as menacing when he’s wearing my face.

“You mean to see what it’s like to have everything,” I say. Recently, I’ve seen that that isn’t as true as I once thought, but when we start fighting, I’ll say whatever I can to match his level of snark.

“I don’t have everything,” he bites out. “You don’t know anything about me.”

“Boys, boys,” Penny says, sounding a little worried.

That’s when I realize that Baz smells like smoke again, and I’ve pulled out my wand without even thinking about it.

It’s scary, the way the edges of skin start to glow red again, like he’s a bomb ready to go off.

This is what it must be like for everyone else when they look at me.

It’s a wonder anyone hangs around me at all. And it’s no wonder Baz does everything he can to stay away. Maybe he’s the only person around here with any sense of self-preservation.

I tuck my wand away and try to think of something to say to Baz to help him calm down, but he takes a deep breath and manages to steady himself this time.

“Let’s stop arguing and try to come up with a way to fix this,” Penny says after a moment.

“And how do you propose we do that?” I ask.

“Research.”

I groan and run a hand through my hair. Baz’s hair is soft as my fingers run through it, and even though I never would have admitted this before, I’ve always wondered what it would feel like if I could get my hands on it. I’m letting it hang loose around my face again today, and it reaches just below my chin. I don’t know why Baz always slicks it back.

It looks nice like this in my opinion, a slight wave to it and dark as night, framing his pale features nicely. It’s a shame that he always keeps it back, never allowing anyone to see how nice his hair really is.

Penny and Baz start talking about something, but I’m barely listening. I’m too busy remembering Baz’s reaction to the way that I did his hair today, before he made me change it.

I spent most of yesterday frustratedly pushing it out of my face because it kept getting it in the way, so today, I knew that I needed to do something different.

There was a hair clip that Penny must have left in our room that I never remembered to return to her, and I thought it would do quite nicely to keep the hair out of my face. It was a simple thing, silver and a little sparkly, and it stood out nicely against the dark strands of Baz’s hair.

I didn’t think it looked too bad, but when Baz confronted me, I honestly thought that he was going to hit me. He held back, though. I guess he didn’t want to do anything to mess up his pretty face.

“I told you not to make me look like a fool,” he said when he confronted me.

I just shrugged at him. “I think it looks good.”

He looked really angry, though. If I’m being honest, I did want to see what kind of reaction I’d get out of him. I knew he wouldn’t let me wear it like that, but what I didn’t expect was for him to pull out a hair tie and offer to pull it back for me.

I almost said no, but I shrugged instead, pulling the clip out of my hair and letting Baz do whatever he wanted with it.

He only pulled part of it back, just enough to get it out of my face, leaving the rest of it hanging. It was a nice compromise, and it looked even better than it did with the clip.

“Simon,” Penny says now, startling me out of the memory, and from the tone of her voice, it isn’t the first time she’s tried to get my attention.

“Sorry, what?” I ask, jerking my head up to find both her and Baz staring at me.

“We’re going to split up to find some books. Here’s your list, and we’ll meet back in your room when we’re done.

Baz quirks a brow at her. “How exactly do you plan to get into our dorm?”

“I have my ways,” she says, and with that, she’s up and marching off to one part of the library.

Baz doesn’t spare me a glance as he stands and goes off on his own, so I’m left to figure out where to find mine on my own. The library is bigger than it appears, and I can see why they thought we should split up. It’s going to take me forever just to find the three on the list Penny gave me.

It doesn’t take as long as I thought it would to find the books, though, and I’m pretty sure that I’m the only one of us who checks out the books properly.

The three of us gather in mine and Baz’s room to go through the books. An hour or so later, I’m almost certain that there isn’t a piece of useful information in any of them. I toss the one that I’m looking at aside and fall back down on the floor with a groan.

Penny is spread out across my bed, and Baz is sitting at his desk.

I watch them quietly while Penny scribbles down a few words into a notebook she grabbed from my desk, and I’m hoping that she has found something useful.

When she looks up a few minutes later, the expression on her face tells me that she hasn’t.

“I’m sorry, guys, but I don’t think there’s anything useful in these books. This has never happened to anyone before.”

I sigh and continue staring up at the ceiling until Baz speaks.

“I’m still not convinced that Simon didn’t do something.”

“Not this again,” I groan. “What is it going to take to make you believe that I didn’t do anything?”

“Who else could have done it? It was just the two of us in our room when it happened. Unless the room suddenly came to life, it had to have been you.”

“Wait,” Penny says suddenly, slamming shut the book she was leafing through and standing up. “I think I know what’s wrong.”

“What is it?” I ask hopefully, sitting up to look at her.

“Just give me like ten minutes, and I’ll be back.”

“Where are you going?”

“The library. There’s a book I remember looking at a few years ago. I think it’ll tell us what we need.”

“Shouldn’t we go with you?” Baz asks, and I want to agree with him.

She shakes her head. “It’s fine. Just wait here. And try not to get into any arguments while I’m gone.”

When she’s gone, Baz and I are left sitting in an uncomfortable silence, and for some reason, I feel the need to fill it.

“Does she honestly think that we’ll just start arguing if left alone for too long?”

“She’s not wrong, is she?” Baz has turned back to his desk, so he’s not even facing me anymore.

“We could get along,” I say, and I can just imagine him quirking a brow at me. “If we wanted to,” I add.

“I don’t know about that. We’ve never been able to get along, not once in the nearly eight years that we’ve known each other.”

“Why is that?” I ask, my voice soft and wondering.

He sighs. “I don’t know, Snow. Maybe we just weren’t meant to be friends.”

“What, you think we were destined to be rivals?”

He turns to me now and studies my face for a moment before responding.

“It makes sense. You’re the Mage’s Heir, and I’m the heir of two strong Family lines. We were never going to be on the same side.”

“Don’t you think that we could change that if we wanted?”

“How? And what would be the point?”

“It would be better than fighting.” Why wouldn’t we be able to get along if we just tried? And why is Baz so against this?

“How would that even work? We’d just start being nice to each other?”

I shrug. “Maybe.”

He shakes his head. “I don’t think it would work.”

“Why not?”

“You and I will never get along. We’re too different.”

I want to say something more, but then there’s a light knock at the door before it opens to reveal Penny, carrying a rather thin book. You’d think a book that held all the answers to our problem would be bigger than that.

**Baz**

“Good. You’re both still in one piece,” Bunce says when she re-enters our room.

I make a noncommittal noise, turning away from Simon and that look in his eyes that pulls at my heart, before asking, “Did you find what you were looking for?”

“Yep. And I’m pretty sure that I know how to switch you back.”

“How?” I ask, sitting up straighter as I start to feel hopeful. “Is there a spell or something?”

“Not exactly.”

“Then, what did you find out?”

Bunce chews on her bottom lip for a moment, and I start to get a bad feeling about this. Whatever it is that we need to do is not going to be easy.

“What is the book about?” Simon asks when she doesn’t say anything immediately.

“The Anathema.”

“You think that’s what did this?” He looks around our room warily, like he’s worried that it’s going to suddenly start attacking us.

“Yes, and it makes sense. Neither of you cast a spell, and there’s nothing else in your room that could have caused it.”

“I’m still not convinced Baz didn’t do something.”

“Oh, yeah, because I just love having to pretend to be you.”

“You guys have to stop fighting,” Bunce says, interrupting us.

“Why don’t you just tell us what we need to do to switch back so that we can just be done with all of this?” Simon says.

“Well, that’s the thing… The only way to fix this is to get along.”

“So, we just stop fighting?”

“It’s a little more complicated than that.” She glances between the two of us, but I continue to be silent.

“Would you please stop being so confusing and just tell us what it says in that book?”

“It’s mostly speculation. No one can really prove anything, but it’s rumored that if two roommates have a copious amount of animosity between them, the Anathema will take measures to try to correct it, to bring them together. From what I’ve read, though, it’s never made any two roommates switch bodies.”

“What _has_ it done?” Simon asks, eyes wide.

“In most cases, it locked them in their room together until they worked out whatever was going on between them. There’s another case where the details are a little murky, and one of the roommates got unusually violent, which got him cast out of the room — and the school.”

“Why does it do this?”

“No one really knows. They’re just sure that It only does it if it truly believes that there is a chance that the two people can work together, so it must think that there is hope for the two of you.”

“Why didn’t it just lock us together?” I ask.

“It probably didn’t think that that would work. Simon probably would have gone off, and he’d get kicked out of the school.”

He glares at me but doesn’t say anything, turning back to Penny instead.

“So, what you’re saying is that if we don’t find a way to get along, we’ll be stuck like this forever?”

“Yes, that is what it looks like.”

“Okay, so we pretend to like each other.” Simon shrugs. “Sounds simple enough.”

“Simon, it has to be real. You have to find a way to really become friends. There’s no way to trick it.”

Simon scoffs, carefully avoiding my gaze as he says, “According to Baz, that can’t be done. We can’t be friends.”

“Neither of you really have a choice unless you want to be stuck like this forever.”

I grit my teeth. We were almost out of here. I could have gotten out of Watford without anyone ever finding out how I feel about Simon, but now, we’re being forced together. We have to pretend to like each other, and I’m worried that I’ll accidentally do something to show him just how much I truly like him.

I’m screwed either way, but I think that I’d rather be outed and in my own body than stuck in Simon’s body, feeling trapped, for the rest of my life.

“We’ll make it work,” I say quietly.

“But you said—.”

“I know what I said, Snow, but I don’t seem to have a choice, do I?”

I don’t mean to snap at him, but this entire situation has me on edge.

**Simon**

Penny leaves the room not long after telling Baz and I that we somehow have to get along, and even though I know she needed to get to her own room before it got too late, I wish that she had stayed and helped us figure out how we are going to do this.

I know that it’s weird to need someone else’s help to find a way to be friends with your roommate, but when have things not been weird with me and Baz?

From that first day, when he resisted taking my hand while we stood around the Crucible, things have been weird. There’s this rivalry that, when you think about it for a while, doesn’t make a lot of sense. And trust me, I’ve had a lot of time to think about it.

If this is a fight between the Mage and the Families, why do Baz and I keep getting thrust into the middle of it? We’re our own people, and it isn’t our fight; it’s theirs. So why can’t we just be us?

And then there’s all of the fighting. Baz hasn’t actually tried to kill me in a while, but it’s like he can’t go long without picking a fight. It’s never over anything meaningful, and it’s usually over before either of us can do any real damage.

It would be so easy for us to just decide not to fight, so why haven’t we done that?

I can see why the Anathema would think we had the potential to get past the animosity, but were these drastic measures really necessary?

First, the Crucible put us together. And now the Anathema is forcing us to get along. It’s like the school is conspiring against us or something.

Except the opposite because it’s trying to bring us together rather than tear us apart.

Tired of all this rationalizing and research, I decide to get ready for bed.

Baz and I can start being friends tomorrow. Right now, I need sleep.


	4. Chapter 4

**Simon**

Baz and I haven’t fought at all today, but nothing feels different either. I tell Penny as much after dinner, and her response is to roll her eyes at me.

“What?” I ask.

“Avoiding each other isn’t the same thing as getting along. You guys have to actually try.”

“So we have to actually spend time together?” I was hoping that just not tearing into each other and being friendly in our room would be enough.

“Yes. The Anathema can obviously sense the tension between the two of you. It’s going to take more than one day of not fighting to work through that.”

I sigh. “Great. We’re never going to switch back. Baz and I will never be able to get along.”

“Have you ever really tried? I’m sure that you two have more in common than you think. I mean, the Crucible cast the two of you together for a reason. And who knows? Maybe Baz will surprise you.”

He already has surprised me. I mean, I never thought about how difficult it must be for him to be a vampire, surrounded by people who are trying to get rid of dark creatures. And I was no different.

I only ever saw the worst in him, and I never once tried to get to know him.

This is my chance to change all of that. To show Baz that I don’t care whether he’s a vampire, that I want to get to know the real him.

I have to show him that I want to know the real him, and maybe along the way, I’ll find that I actually like him.

“Okay,” I say to Penny. “I’ll try to be friends with Baz.”

Of course, that’s easier said than done.

When I get back to our room after feeding and thinking through what she said, I tell Baz what Penny said about us needing to actually try to be friends, and even though he doesn’t seem too happy about that, we’re now sitting across from each other on our separate beds working to force a conversation. It’s really awkward, and I’m starting to wish that I were anywhere but here, but at least we’re trying.

We’ve lapsed into silence, and I rack my brain for something, anything, to say. What do you say to someone who you’ve lived with for nearly eight years but have never really talked to before? How does that even happen? How have we managed to dislike each other for so long?

Penny was right; the Crucible cast us together for a reason. And the Anathema must have had a reason for making us switch bodies. Everything is telling us that we should be friends, but we’ve been fighting it for so long that we don’t know how to stop. What would happen if we gave into it? Could we actually be friends? Could we have been friends this entire time and not even known that it was possible?

This is our chance to find out, and I want to know. I want to know what it would be like to be Baz’s friend. It’s got to be better than being his rival.

I have to start with something simple, something we have in common, like magic.

“So,” I begin quietly, drawing out the word, “you can just summon fire?”

I’ve seen him do it before, even without his wand in his hand. I’ve thought about trying it while in his body, but I’m so worried that I’ll burn something down that I haven’t even attempted it.

“Yeah, it’s because of the Pitch line. It’s the house of fire.”

“Could you teach me how?” I haven’t given myself the chance to think this through yet, but it’s something that could bring us together. If it goes well, that is.

“You wouldn’t be able to do it in your own body,” he says, but he’s looking at me curiously.

“I know, but why not take advantage of it while I can?”

“Okay.” He moves to sit next to me on my bed and says, “Give me your hand,” and I think that I imagine the hesitation in his voice, the way it wavers.

I hold out my hand, palm up, and I nearly jump when he reaches out and place his hand underneath mine.

He raises a brow at me but doesn’t comment on it.

“It’s just like summoning your magic, but instead of pushing it out through your wand, you’re going to focus it on this spot right _here_.” His thumb presses down on the middle of my palm, and I nearly jump out of my skin. Since when am I so jumpy when he touches me?

I shiver as he runs his hand over that spot, such a surprisingly gentle gesture. It sends sparks up my arm. That seems to happen anytime we touch, but we both seem to have silently agreed not to talk about it.

“Okay,” I say, taking a deep breath, and I almost frown when he lets go of my hand, missing his touch for some reason.

I keep my eyes trained on my hand as I think about pulling on my magic, focusing it on my palm. My fingertips tingle, and I think about holding a flame.

After a few quiet minutes, I realize that it isn’t going to work.

“I can’t do it,” I say defeatedly.

“Yes, you can. That was just your first try.” He smiles at me encouragingly, and my heart does a little flip. “Close your eyes.”

My first instinct is to resist it. Closing your eyes around your rival is how you let him catch you off guard, but trust is something I’m going to have to learn with Baz if I want to be friends with him, so I do it anyway.

“You need to think about lighting a match inside your heart and blowing on the tinder,” he says quietly, and instead of it sounding like he’s talking through my body, it’s like I can actually hear his voice again, gently talking me through this.

“What?”

“It was something that my mom used to say. I used to watch the fire dance in her hands when I was little, thinking that she was magical before I even really knew what magic was.”

He gets quiet, and I open my eyes to find him staring at his hands and want to reach out to comfort him. I don’t, though. I just give him a minute before we try it again.

Closing my eyes again, I think about lighting a match and holding the flame in my hand. I imagine the warmth of it growing and flickering, my magic channeled into the palm of my hand.

My skin tingles again, but this time, I can feel it building.

“You did it,” Baz murmurs beside me.

I open my eyes to look, and he’s right. I’m holding a small flame in the palm of my hand.

I wait for it to burn me, but I barely even feel the heat coming from it.

“It’s so cool,” I say, amazed.

“Maybe if I wasn’t so flammable, it would be,” he says somewhat bitterly, looking away from me.

“Oh.” I close my hand into a fist, extinguishing the fire.

“You can stop feeling sorry for me.”

“I don’t feel sorry for you.”

“You’re a terrible liar, Snow.”

“Fine. I do feel a little bad for you, but I’m also amazed.” He still won’t look at me, but I’m telling him the truth.

“What?”

“You’ve been dealt this horrible hand, but look at you.”

“Technically, I am looking at me.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“What _did_ you mean?” He looks at me now, expression unreadable, so I tell him what I mean, listing them off.

“You’re smart. You’re obviously very caring, from what I’ve seen. And from the way that I’ve interacted with Dev and Niall, you are a pretty good friend to them, even if you like to pretend that they’re just your minions or whatever. You’re a good person, even after what happened to you and your mom.” I pause for a moment, considering. “I’m just amazed by you is all. You’re nothing like I thought you were.”

**Baz**

I’m at a loss for words. Simon is actually being nice to me and saying that he admires me and what I’ve done, and I don’t know how to respond. I shift uncomfortably under the weight of his gaze.

We’re both sitting together on his bed, so close that if I were to move, our arms would bump.

I was just holding his hand a few minutes ago, and it felt like anything was possible as I talked him through summoning the flame.

I can’t even begin to imagine what it must be like to finally be able to use magic after years of never being able to get it right. The way that his face lit up when he saw the flame was what hit me. I couldn’t keep my eyes off of him, and when he spoke again, I had to do what I could to protect my heart, so of course, I said something snarky, ruining the moment.

I just can’t let myself get too close to him.

I know that it’s the only way that we’ll be able to switch back, but I’ve worked so hard to keep this divide between us for over seven years. How can I be expected to suddenly let go of that?

I’m afraid that letting myself get too close to him will show him how I truly feel about him.

He’s looking at me expectantly now, and I still don’t know how to respond to him.

“We should go to bed,” I say, looking away from him once more, and I’m grateful when he moves to the other bed without saying anything.

**Simon**

I’m a little surprised when he says that we should go to bed. I thought that we were finally getting somewhere, but I move over to his bed, and he doesn’t even look at me for the rest of the night.

I dress for bed quietly, biting back all of the questions that are bursting to get out of me.

Did I say something wrong? Does he think that I was lying?

I meant every word that I said to him, and I don’t understand his reaction at all.

With one last lingering glance in his direction, I spell out the lights and settle into bed. It takes a moment, but my eyes easily adjust to the dark. It’s still a little strange, but as I turn on my side to face him, I can see him almost perfectly, and I’m secretly grateful for this ability because I can look at him now without worrying about him catching me.

As I watch the rise and fall of his chest, I wish that I could go back to that moment when he was holding my hand and instructing me on how to use my magic. His expression was so open, and in that moment, it felt like it really was possible for us to be friends. All we needed was to try.

But he changed so quickly that I can’t figure out what it is that he wants. Is he only pretending so that we can go back to the way we were or is there something else going on with us?

These questions keep me up for most of the night, but there’s something else bothering me, too. There’s this feeling in my chest, and I don’t quite know what it is.

I think it started around the time that I summoned the fire in my hand, but I don’t know what caused it. All I know is that even after I’ve rolled back over, I can’t stop thinking about Baz, and it isn’t until I finally fall asleep that it goes away.

In the morning, my first thought is of him, and for a moment I imagine that I can feel his hand on mine again, just like last night. I rub my eyes, which are burning from the utter lack of sleep, and pull the blanket up and over my face, blocking out the rising sun peeking through the curtains.

I end up lying in bed long after I hear Baz get up and ready for the day, leaving the room before I even open my eyes. Groaning, I sit up and try to forget Baz and the way my heart keeps stuttering when I remember last night.

I want to skip classes for the day and try to figure out what this feeling is that is growing within me, but I know that Baz would kill me if I messed with his attendance.

I slowly get ready, and I end up being a little distracted all morning, but I didn’t think that it was too bad until lunchtime when Dev and Niall bring it up.

“Baz.” I ignore the voice at first, my stomach fluttering just from hearing his name.

“Baz,” Dev says again, getting my attention. “What is going on with you?”

“Nothing,” I say distractedly.

“It’s not nothing. You’ve been acting really strange recently.” He drops his voice as he says, “Did something happen? Have the Families tasked you with something?”

_What does that mean?_ I wonder, but I shake my head.

“It’s…” What can I say to them? I don’t think that Baz would want me to tell them the truth. “It’s just Simon,” I say, hoping that that’s explanation enough. It usually is with Penny.

Dev and Niall exchange a look that I don’t understand since I haven’t been around them enough before they turn back to me, matching expressions on their face, and I know that whatever comes next is not going to be pleasant.

“We’ve been meaning to talk to you about him,” Niall begins softly. “It never really felt like the right time to bring it up, but we think that now is as good as time as any. It seems like something has changed, and we’re pretty sure that it has something to do with Simon.”

“A good time for what?” I ask, confused. Where is this going?

“We know that you don’t hate him anymore,” Dev says. “And that maybe you never did.”

“Of course I do,” I say, because I know that it’s what Baz would want me to do. He would want me to keep up the appearance that he despises me.

“We’re your best friends. You know that you don’t have to lie to us, right? You can trust us.”

“But there’s nothing to tell. I don’t have feelings for him.”

“Are you sure? Because from what we’ve seen, it appears that you do.”

Great, I’ve been acting weird lately, and now Baz’s best friends think that Baz is into me. Or that I’m into him. I don’t know — it’s a little confusing. Either way, Dev and Niall are suspicious, and Baz is going to kill me if he finds out that I have screwed things up this badly.

I know that I’ve been keeping a particularly close eye on Baz lately to make sure that he doesn’t do anything to mess up my own life, but I didn’t think that it was enough to make anyone think that I have _feelings_ for him.

“What makes you think that he—.” I cut myself off. “That I have feelings for him?” I ask curiously. Is it really possible that Baz likes me?

“Something changed around fifth year,” Niall says, and Dev nods in agreement.

_Fifth year?_ I nearly exclaim aloud. Maybe it isn’t my fault that they think something is wrong.

“It’s like the hate went out in you. You stopped doing every horrible thing that your aunt wanted you to, and you don’t pick as many fights with him. You still pay a lot of attention to him, wondering what he’s up to and it was almost like you were doing things to get his attention. We just don’t know why you always push him away so hard or why things seem to have changed these past couple of days.

I sit there quietly for a moment, thinking over what Niall just said. Is what they’re saying the truth? It has to be. They have no reason to make it up. It’s just hard to think about Baz having feelings for me when he can’t even be friendly to me for longer than five minutes.

The thing is that everything that they just said could be said about me if you think about it. The staring, the keeping an eye on him, the fight and hate going out in me. The only question is, do I do all of that just to get his attention?

“You don’t have to tell us if you don’t want to,” Dev says after I still don’t say anything. “We just want you to know that we accept you no matter what.”

“Yeah, and there’s actually something that we’ve been meaning to tell you.” Niall smiles at Dev, and then he brings his hand up to rest on top of Dev’s on the table. “Dev and I are dating.”

I’m not sure how much surprise I can take today. They aren’t even my friends, but I’m happy for them. I don’t know how to respond, though.

“That’s...nice,” I say, feeling a little out of my depth here. I don’t know how Baz would react in this situation, and I’m pretty sure that I’m screwing this all up. I decide that being honest about how I feel is the best thing to do, and I’m sure it’s how Baz would feel, too. It’s who he is. “I mean, I’m happy for you. You deserve to be with the person you love.”

“The same goes for you,” Dev says, giving me a meaningful look.

“I don’t love him,” I say defensively, realizing a moment too late that they never actually said anything about love before.

“Are you sure about that?”

I look Baz’s way, where he’s sitting with Penny, talking to her, a small smile playing on his lips. My heart does a little flip, and I can feel myself smiling, too.

Maybe I’m not sure about that. Maybe I _do_ have feelings for Baz. It could explain the fluttering in my chest last night, but that doesn’t mean that he feels the same way about me.

And now that we’re in each other’s bodies, that definitely complicates things.

If I’m being honest with myself, I don’t hate Baz, but I don’t know if ‘love’ is what I would call how I feel about him either. I’ll have to think about that more. After we find a way to switch back. It’s hard enough trying to be his friend without letting feelings that I may or may not have complicate things even more.

We finish lunch without any more talk about feelings that Baz or I may have for each other, and I push all thoughts of it aside. I put it on the list of things that I don’t want to think about right now. I can think about it later when things are less complicated and when I’m not being forced to be around him.

I need to take time to figure things out on my own and decide whether it’s worth acting on. I don’t even know whether it’s possible for Baz to feel the same way about me. Dev and Niall could be wrong about it.

**Baz**

Simon is acting a little weird today. First, he seemed a little out of it, and now, it’s like he can’t seem to sit still.

I catch up with him after dinner, and when I place my hand on his arm to get his attention, he jumps and spins around so fast that I am almost surprised when he doesn’t have a wand in hand, ready to send a spell at me.

“A-Are you alright?” I ask, stammering a bit, unable to control it.

“I’m fine. I’m just a little distracted.”

“Would you like to talk about it?” I offer, whether it’s for show or not, I’m uncertain.

He looks down at me, a strange glimmer in his eyes, and it isn’t until now that I know what it must feel like for him to be shorter than me, even if it is just a few inches. It was something that I have lorded over him, and I suppose it’s fair that I am now experiencing what that is like.

He shakes his head, and the glimmer is gone. “There’s just something that I need to figure out.”

I want to ask him about it, but before I can say anything else, Penelope is falling into step beside us, and I’m walking between the two of them as we head to mine and Simon’s room.

I’m not sure when hanging out with Simon and Penny after dinner became a habit, but it’s the only time that I feel like I can really be myself recently. After spending the day pretending to be someone else, it’s nice to relax. I don’t have to hide myself from them.

It’s weird feeling this way around two people who I barely even talked to before this week, but I love finally having a place where I can be myself.

It’s not that I couldn’t be myself around Dev and Niall. I just was always wary of the fact that the Families were pressuring them, too, and if I made a wrong step, it would be easy for them to rat me out.

I want to trust them, but I know how hard my aunt has worked to get information out of me, so I know how hard other people will work to get information out of them, whether they want to give it up or not. So, I’ve had to hide myself from them somewhat and not be too open about how I feel.

But with Penny and Simon, I know that they won’t go anywhere near the families, and I feel like I can trust them. I _want _to trust them.

The three of us spend the evening studying together and being friendly, and for the most part, I don’t really think about how I’m in somebody else’s body. I’m just being myself.

“Why are we even studying?” Simon asks after a while. “It’s Friday. We’ve got all weekend to do homework.”

“True,” Penny agrees. “And the good thing is that you two won’t have to worry about pretending in front of everyone during classes for the next two days. Your sole focus can be on getting along and trying to switch back.”

Simon nods in agreement, but for some reason that doesn’t make me feel good.

What happens after we switch back? Will we still be able to be friends? Or will we go back to the way we were?

I want us to continue to be friends, but I have to find a way to make Simon want the same thing.

Not long after that, Penny decides to head back to her room, and it’s just me and Simon.

I remember what she was saying about us not having to pretend anymore, at least for a bit, and I like the sound of that. Two whole days of nothing.

_We’re screwed_, I realize.

**Simon**

“We have a problem,” Baz says abruptly.

“What is it?”

“Football.”

“What about it?”

“There’s football practice tomorrow, and you have to go.”

“Oh.”

Oh, no. I forgot about football. As soon as I step onto the pitch in Baz’s body, people will know that something’s up. No matter how much I like the sport, I’ve never been any good at it, and Baz is one of the best players this school has ever seen.

We have to do something, or everyone will know that we’ve switched bodies

“We’re screwed,” Baz says. “I’m screwed. If you go out there and can’t play, then I’ll get in trouble.”

“Maybe they’ll think you’re having an off day.”

“I don’t have _off days_,” he sneers, I have to fight the urge to roll my eyes at him.

“What if we practiced tonight?” I suggest. “No one will be out on the pitch tonight, and you could give me some tips.”

“Do you honestly think that you can learn how to play in one night?”

“I already know how to play. You would just be giving some tips on how to be better.”

Baz considers it for a brief moment, then shakes his head. “There has to be something else we can do.”

“I could just not show up.”

“You’ll get me kicked off the team.”

“Then we’re out of options. You have to help me get better.”

“It’s pretty late, and it’s pitch black outside. Plus, the bridge is up. We won’t be able to get out to the pitch.”

“Then, we’ll practice out by the courtyard. And we can take some lanterns. Or I could start a fire,” I suggest, my hand warming at just the thought.

“You’d probably end up setting the pitch on fire, which I suppose might be a good thing if it gets us out of practice tomorrow,” he says thoughtfully.

“Why are you being so difficult?” I ask, not trying to be mean, just a little annoyed that he won’t even consider it.

“You know what? Fine.” He sighs, tearing a hand through his hair. “I’ll help you.”

***

“I think I can see now why I didn’t make it through try-outs,” I say half an hour later, sitting on the ground from where I just fell, the ball nowhere the makeshift goal.

“You aren’t that bad,” Baz says, but I just give him a look. He holds out his hand, and I let him pull me to my feet, my hand warming where our skin makes contact.

“You don’t have to lie,” I say. “I know I’m not any good.”

“I’m not lying. I really think that you’ll be able to pull this off tomorrow.”

I get back into position, and we try it again. Baz manages to get the ball from me, and I don’t even attempt to go after him this time, knowing that he’ll score. Even though I’m in Baz’s body, it doesn’t mean that I got his talent or skills for this.

If I’m being honest, I’m having fun doing this, spending time with Baz and playing football with him. I may not be the best player, but I’ve always loved this game.

We practice a bit more, but after I’ve tripped for the third time, nearly taking Baz down with me, we decide to call it. Baz’s arm is still around me from where he caught me when I nearly fell, and I’m suddenly aware of how close we are like this.

Our breathing is loud in the quiet of the night, and his eyes sparkle in the low light of the lanterns that we set up. They doubled as goal posts, and now I’m glad that they aren’t strong enough to illuminate my features. Who knows what Baz would see there?

Would he be able to take one look at me and read what I’m thinking? Would he know that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about him and the feelings that I quite possibly hold for him ever since Dev and Niall suggested that there might be something there?

I’m not sure how much more of this that I can take before I do something that I might regret, that might ruin the chances of us being friends - and switching back. I have to break the heavy silence between us.

Finally, I say the first thing that I can think of.

“Dev and Niall are a couple,” I blurt, effectively ruining the moment.

I turn away from Baz, and he drops his arm. Without his touch bearing down on me, I feel like I can breathe again. We quietly gather the lanterns and start heading back towards Mummers House.

“How do you know?” He asks as we fall into step together. “I mean, I suspected, but they never said anything.”

“We were talking at dinner, and they told me - or rather, they told you.”

“Right.” He nods, but then, “What were you talking about that led to this confession?”

“Um,” I say, trying to stall, glad that I can’t blush the way that I would have in my own body. That must have something to do with the lack of blood coursing through my body.

I can’t tell him the truth. He might get defensive, and it would ruin this warmth between us. I’ve never felt as good in Baz’s presence as I do right now.

“Nothing really.” I shrug. “It kind of came out of nowhere.”

“How did you respond?”

“Well, I wasn’t sure how you would have responded in that situation, so I just told them that I was happy for them.”

“No, that’s good. I am happy for them. I’m glad that they could find love. And with someone who feels the same way about them.”

_Funny_, I think. _That’s pretty much what I said._

We’re passing by the White Chapel now, and my thirst seems to come back, stronger than ever. I had been doing my best to ignore it while we were playing together, but it’s getting harder to ignore. I didn’t want to ruin this nice moment between us, but the thirst would have kept me up all night, and it’s probably better if we quit while we’re ahead.

“I’m going to stop by the Catacombs. I’ll see you back at our room.”

“I can wait outside the Chapel for you.” His face turns a bright shade of red as he says it, and if I had any blood in me, I’m sure that I’d be blushing, too. “I-If you want me to, I mean.”

“Sure,” I say slowly. “It’d be nice not to have to walk back alone.”

Feeling a little uncomfortable, knowing that he’ll be waiting for me, I mostly feel warm inside, like he actually lit a match inside my heart, and I’m so glad that he can’t see the smile growing on my face as I turn away from him.

Maybe Dev and Niall were right. Maybe I have feelings for him.

I put it on the list of things not to think about, but when have I ever been good at not thinking about Baz?

**Baz**

I know that it was weird to offer to wait for him, but I also know what it’s like to feed and then have to walk back to our room alone. It isn’t enough that I’m already different from everyone else, but every day, I have to worry about someone finding out and turning me into the Mage.

I like that this feels like something that I can share with Simon. Even after we switch back, he’ll know what it’s like, and maybe it’s something that could bring us together.

I won’t make him tag along with me - I don’t want him to watch me feed - but maybe I’ll have someone who I can talk about this with, someone who has experienced what it’s like, for however short amount of time.

I lean against the wall of the Chapel before sliding down and sitting in the grass. It’s a nice night, and I rarely ever stop to enjoy nights like this.

I’ve always got something to worry about or homework to do. I almost never take time out of my day to just stop and enjoy life. Who knew that Simon would be the person to get me to do it, even if he has no idea the kind of effect he is having on me?

**Simon**

It is actually nice to come back out of the Catacombs and find Baz waiting for me outside. It made me feel like I didn’t have to hide what I had just been doing or worrying about someone finding out.

When we switch back and everything goes back to normal - or as close to normal as they can - I’ll have to offer to do the same thing for him. I want to.

We could be friends after all of this, and he wouldn’t have to go through all of this vampire stuff alone. I’ll be there for him.

I’d be there for Baz every single day of our lives if he would let me.

The realization of this nearly overwhelms me.

I care deeply for Baz, and it wasn’t until I was forced to really get to know him and see the real him that I even noticed.

I always thought that this obsession with him was caused by the rivalry.

How could I have been so wrong?


	5. Chapter 5

**Simon**

Football practice gets rained out, and I’m left with more time to spend with Baz. I’m a little disappointed by it, but I think the thing that I really wanted was another chance to play against Baz, which wouldn’t have happened anyway. At least this way, we have the whole day to talk and enjoy each other’s company.

We’re sitting on the floor between our beds together, leaning back against his bed. He’s studying, and I’m only pretending to.

I reach up to run a hand through my hair, but it’s tied up, stopping me from doing that. I let Baz tie it up in a bun today before the storm blew in, and it felt so nice to have his hands in my hair that I had to fight to keep myself from leaning into the touch. It felt like it took him longer than it should have, but I didn’t say anything about it.

The window in our room is open, letting in the sound of the storm raging outside, and the air coming in is warm.

We’ve spent most of the day in our room together, which is different from when we used to try to avoid being in here together as much as possible unless we were asleep. We’ve talked and helped each other with homework, and as it nears lunchtime, I dread leaving this room, not wanting this feeling to end.

It’s almost like hanging out with Penny. Somehow, in such a short time, Baz has become one of my closest friends. It feels like we should have been this way all along. We just needed to stop fighting long enough to see that.

The only difference between hanging out with him and with Penny is the way that I feel about him.

I’m pretty sure that you aren’t supposed to feel this way about your friends. You’re aren’t supposed to look at the way that they’re face lights up with a smile or the way that they laugh about something and want to kiss them.

You aren’t supposed to want to kiss your friends at all. At least, not ones who you are solely friends with.

But Baz and I aren’t solely friends. We have so much history between us, and I’ve spent so much time studying him, waiting for him to slip up, that I already know so much about him.

When we started growing closer, this was inevitable. It was only a matter of time before I realized that we were never just rivals, and I’m glad that this happened.

It’s weird to be happy about switching bodies with someone, but I can’t even imagine what it would have been like to realize that I have feelings for him when we were still acting like we hated each other. It likely would have torn me up inside every time that he said something harsh or sneered at me like I didn’t mean anything to him.

Maybe this is what the Anathema wanted when it made us switch bodies. It wanted us to be brought closer together so that we didn’t tear each other apart. It wanted us to find a way to work together.

I don’t think that I was supposed to fall for him, though. That was an unexpected side effect of this whole thing.

And maybe it isn’t a new thing. Maybe I’ve felt this way about him for a long time. I just didn’t know what that feeling was until now.

Baz closes the book he was reading suddenly and tosses it aside, and I nearly startle at the sound of it.

“This is hopeless,” he says with a sigh.

“You can get it,” I say. “You’re top of our class for a reason.”

“No, not that. I’m talking about us.”

I keep my features blank, not letting on how much the words sting, but my heart sinks in my chest.

“We’re just wasting our time at this point. Hanging out with you all day isn’t accomplishing anything. It’s pointless.”

I swallow around the lump in my throat and look away from him. With just a few words, he has managed to cause me more pain that he could have with his wand.

I hadn’t realized how much of an inconvenience it was for Baz to spend time with me. Does he really hate being around me that much?

“We should be looking for another way to switch back,” he keeps talking, apparently not even noticing the fact that I haven’t responded. “Or maybe we should just tell one of the professors what has happened to us.”

“What can they tell us that we don’t already know?” I ask. Wasn’t he the one who didn’t want anyone to know about this just the other day?

“They’re more experienced, and they probably have books that aren’t available to us in the library. Come on, don’t tell me that you aren’t tired of being stuck with me like this.”

I shouldn’t take it personally. He probably doesn’t mean for it to sound so harsh. He’s probably just ranting, like he would to a friend, but I can’t say that his words don’t hurt.

“It’s not so bad,” I say quietly, staring at a spot on my bed in front of us.

“What?”

“I mean, yeah, it isn’t great not being in my body, but spending time with you? I don’t mind that.” I’m opening myself up to get even more hurt, but honesty is the only thing that is going to help in this situation. “I actually kind of like this.”

“Simon, I didn’t mean it like that.” His voice has softened, and my eyes are drawn back to him. “I-I like spending time with you, too. I just hate pretending to be someone that I’m not.”

I nod my head slowly. “I get that.”

“I’m sorry for what I said. I’m not mad at you. I’m mad at this situation.”

“I know.” I sigh, whether with relief or defeat, I’m unsure.

“I also want you to know that after this, if we ever switch back, I want—.” He cuts himself off, and I wait with bated breath to hear what it is that he wants. “I still want to be your friend. It’s been nice these past few days, and I don’t want things to go back to the way they were. I want things to be different.”

I search his face, trying to gauge whether what he is saying to me is actually the truth. His expression is so open, and the corner of his mouth is turned up in an almost smile. My heart does a flip, and I know that he’s telling me the truth.

“I want that, too,” I say, setting the books in my lap aside so that I can turn to face him better.

Our hands rest on the ground between us, so close that our pinky fingers almost brush each other. When I move my hand, they do, and that strange feeling is back again. Like our skin is meant to touch, like we’re trying to get to the place that we are meant to be.

I don’t know if that place is together or in our own bodies, but honestly, it doesn’t matter. I feel drawn towards Baz. It’s like some supernatural force is pulling us closer, and I lean closer to him until we’re so close that the tips of our noses bump together.

I meet his eyes, and the way that he’s looking at me causes my heart to start racing in my chest. I tilt my head just slightly to the side, and I give in to the pull. I close the distance between us, and a sigh escapes me as our lips meet.

**Baz**

So, this is what it’s like to kiss Simon Snow.

It’s so much better than I ever could have imagined.

When our lips first met, it almost felt like I was kissing myself. It was a strange feeling, but when I let my eyes fall shut and leant into his touch, there was no doubt that I was kissing Simon.

There are sparks and butterflies, and as our lips slide together, we fit perfectly. It is like we were meant to be like this. Here, together.

He brings his hand up to cup my face, and the cool touch brings me back down, grounding me. I’m no longer floating, but that’s a good thing.

I feel tethered to Earth, and it’s all because of Simon.

I never knew that anything could feel like this.

**Simon**

Baz’s lips are soft against mine, moving sweetly, hesitantly, until we pull away a few moments later.

When I open my eyes, I’m no longer looking into my own face. I’m looking at a face that’s so much more familiar than my own, and I feel a smile start to tug at my corner as I realize that our feelings for each other are what put things back to the way they should be.

“Baz,” I whisper, my fingers brushing down the side of his face lightly, almost reverently.

I want to grin at him and kiss him again, but then I see the anger in his expression, and the smile slips from my face.

“Snow,” he replies curtly. He doesn’t sound happy, and I don’t understand why not. We’re back to ourselves. Shouldn’t we be celebrating?

I drop my hand from his face, feeling like he just burned me. I start to ask what’s wrong, but he speaks first, anger extremely evident in his tone.

“What book told you to do that?”

“What?” I ask, jerking away from him in shock.

“Did you kiss me just to make the Anathema happy?”

“You don’t honestly believe that, do you?” My blood runs cold at the look on his face. I scoot away from him before standing up. He stands, too, and he looks like he wants to hit me.

“Why wouldn’t I? You’ve never shown any kind of interest in me before, and all of a sudden, you’re kissing me. And that just so happens to be the thing that switches us back.”

Disbelief turns into anger as he talks. I can’t believe that he thinks I’d kiss him without it meaning something.

“I don’t think that the Anathema meant for us to kiss when this all began,” I say, practically shouting at him.

“Then, why did you do it?”

“Because I wanted to!” This time, I am yelling. “Maybe it just took being in your body for a few days to make me see how I already felt about you. I didn’t know it would switch us back. I wasn’t even thinking about that. I was only thinking about you and how my heart races when you come near me. I can’t believe that you’d think that I w-would—.” I shake my head. “Whatever. It doesn’t matter. You’re you again, and I suppose that’s all that matters.

Before he can stop me, I turn and stomp out of our room, slamming the door behind me.

When I get outside, groups of students are headed to the Tower for lunch, and I easily blend into the crowd. I need to get away from Baz, and I need to find Penny.

I frantically search for her, hoping that she’s not already in the dining hall, and just before I reach it, I see her.

“Penny,” I call as I draw nearer to her.

She turns to me, and I say her name again, quieter this time, feeling my voice break.

“Baz?” She asks, brows furrowing. “Are you okay?”

I shake my head. “It’s me. It’s Simon.”

Her eyes widen. “How did you fix it?”

I glance around us at the people walking past us and suggest that we go somewhere quiet. We go inside and up to where all the classrooms, finding one that’s unlocked and stepping inside it.

I feel my blood turn hot, anger rolling through me thinking about Baz and what happened in our room, but there are also tears burning at the back of my eyes.

“Alright, tell me what happened,” Penny says gently.

“I–. We–.” I’m really me again, complete with the inability to speak. But that may just be because of the way that my entire body seems to be shaking. “I kissed him.”

Her eyes go wide in a way that would be comical if I didn’t feel like I was about to fall apart. “You _what_?” She exclaims.

“I kissed him,” I repeat, moving to one of the desks and sinking down into the chair. I let my head fall into my hands.

“And that fixed it?”

I nod.

“Then, why don’t you seem happy?”

“Because he hates me.”

“If that were true, the two of you wouldn’t have switched back.”

“He hates me because I kissed him,” I murmur.

It’s still hard to believe it. When I opened my eyes, I expected to that same warmth and softness in his gaze that he had before I kissed him. But the way he looked at me was more than anger. It was something else, something I don’t know how to describe. It was like a mixture of disbelief and disgust.

“Hate seems like a big jump. Are you sure that’s what it was?”

“You weren’t there, Penny,” I say, finally looking back up at her. “You didn’t see the look on his face or hear the way he spoke to me.” I shake my head, trying to hold back the tears. “I shouldn’t have kissed him.”

She moves to sit in the chair next to me, and her expression softens.

“You wanted to kiss him, right?”

“Yes.” I feel my face warm as I struggle to meet her eyes.

“Then, it wasn’t a mistake. Why don’t you tell me what happened after you kissed him, and maybe we can figure out why he reacted the way he did.

I sigh, thinking that it won’t help any, but I tell her anyway. I start just before the kiss when he said that he wanted us to continue being friends and for things to be different, and my face warms even more as I tell her how I moved closer to him and kissed him. Then, my hands clench into fists as I recount his reaction and the things that he said before I stormed out.

When I’m finished, Penny scoots her chair over so that he can she wrap her arm around me in a half-hug, trying to comfort me. I smile at her, but it’s forced, so I let it fall away a moment later.

“I’m sorry,” she says softly.

I shake my head. “It’s fine. I mean, what did I expect?”

“Simon…”

“He was never really going to change. I should have known better.”

“Maybe you should try to talk to him.”

“I can’t. I can’t even face him after this.”

“You can’t hide from him forever. You sleep in the same room.”

I groan. She’s right. I can’t hide from Baz forever. Eventually, I’ll have to face him, but I would rather not have to talk to him right now. I just need some time to deal with this awful feeling inside of me.

“I’ll talk to him later,” I tell her, though it feels like a lie. “Let’s go eat lunch.”

She frowns but agrees, and we leave the classroom, heading back towards the stairs. When we reach the bottom and turn towards the door to the dining hall, Baz is standing there, leaning against the wall. He looks up when he hears us approaching, and his expression is unreadable.

“Baz,” I whisper, coming to a halt.

“Simon, can I talk to you for a moment?”

“Want me to stay?” Penny asks quietly.

I shake my head. “No, I’ve got this.”

She gives me one last look before she leaves us.

“What do you want?” I ask, crossing my arms but not meeting his eyes.

“To talk.”

“I don’t want to talk to you.” I set my jaw and glare at his shoulder. Why can’t he just leave me alone?

“Please.” I’ve never heard him plead before, and I almost give in just for that. But I can’t. I don’t want to hear any more of his cutting remarks.

His hair is still down, but it looks a little wild, like he’s been dragging his hand through it. I hate how attracted to him I am despite every cruel thing he has ever said to me. I want to believe that he has changed, but I don’t know whether I should trust him.

“No,” I tell him. I can’t do this right now. I turn and try to walk around him, but he reaches out to grab my arm and stop me.

I turn to glare at him, and he drops his hand.

“Simon, I’m sorry.”

I chance a glance at his face, and the anger from earlier is gone, but I don’t know if I can trust him.

“I should have trusted you,” he continues. “I shouldn’t have accused you of kissing me just to fix things, and I should have known that it wouldn’t have worked if you didn’t mean it. And I want you to know that I meant what I said before. I like you.”

“Maybe you’re just doing this to make sure that the Anathema doesn’t switch us back,” I say, basically throwing his words from earlier back at him.

“Alright, I can see how wrong what I said was. I shouldn’t have said that.”

“No. You shouldn’t have,” I say. I want to stay mad at him, but at the look on his face, I feel myself wanting to move closer to him.

“I really like you, and I wish that I could take back what I said. But I know that I can’t, so I’m asking for your forgiveness instead.”

He sounds like he means it, and my heart rate has picked up speed, hope feeling my chest.

I want to forgive him and let him take me into his arms. I want to say so many things to him, but nothing sounds right, so I step closer to him, gauging his reaction. He stays completely still but his hands twitch like he wants to reach for me.

Biting back a smile, I move forward and kiss him, cupping his face in my hands to pull him closer.

His arms move to wrap around me, holding me close, and I do smile then.

“I forgive you,” I murmur when we pull apart.

One of his hands comes up to comb through my hair, and I let myself lean into the touch, my eyes falling shut for a moment.

We should have been doing this all along. It’s so much better than fighting, and I almost wish that the Anathema had acted sooner.

Baz is different from the person I thought he was. His life isn’t as perfect as he makes it seem, and he isn’t the monster that he thinks he is either. He’s just Baz, and it feels like he is a part of me now.

Even if this doesn’t work out between us, I’ll be connected to him in a way that I’ll never be to anyone else. I don’t mind, though. I wouldn’t want to switch bodies with anyone else.

I press him up against the wall behind him, and I kiss him again, more fiercely this time. He lets me, and when I flick out my tongue to brush over his lips, they part to let me in.

We kiss for a few minutes, not caring whether anyone finds us like this, before we break apart.

I want to ask him what this means, but I already know the answer to that. And when he takes my hand in his, intertwining our fingers, and leads me into the dining hall for everyone to see us together, I have no doubt that this is something that we both want.

Everything has shifted between us, but everything feels right. This is how we were always meant to be. It has just taken us this long to see it. Baz and I are supposed to be together and happy to be in each other’s arms.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you all for reading!! <3
> 
> Come find me on [Tumblr](https://angelsfalling16.tumblr.com/)


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